Movie Dharma Discussion: Groundhog Day

Compiled by Shen Shi’an : | More Reviews : www.moonpointer.com/movies


About Groundhog Day
Theromance-comedy-fantasy Groundhog Day, starring Bill Murray,opened in theatres in1993, to both critical and commercial success.It tells thetale of a manwho unwittinglyembarks on a spiritual misadventure as he relives a particular day over and over - until he gets it right.It's a timeless tale about the deepersignificance of deja vu experiences, andthe infinite chances we squander and get. Many Buddhists regard the film Groundhog Day as one of the greatest “Buddhist” movies ever produced. [It is also dubbed by some other religious leaders as the most spiritual movie of our time.] Although Groundhog Day does not speak specifically or directly of the Buddhist teachings, the movie explores concepts such as rebirth, karma and self-realisation in a way that religious and non-religious people alike can enjoy and understand.
The film won a British Academy Award for Best Screenplay and a London Critics Circle award for Harold Ramis (director, who became somewhat Buddhist) and Danny Rubin (scriptwriter, who is a Zen Buddhist), who dreamt up the story and co-wrote the screenplay. The film was nominated for a Hugo (the science fiction award). Groundhog Day was released in 1993, and claimed the top spot in the box office for two weeks. Worldwide, the movie brought in more than $100 million.

Plot Summary
Phil Connor is an egocentric weatherman in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who is assigned to cover "Groundhog Day" - the annual festival in the town of Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. A groundhog is a type of very large squirrel or similar rodent that has become important in American legend because it is said that when a groundhog comes out from its underground home in early February, it predicts whether or not winter will continue. If it looks at its own shadow, winter will last six more weeks, and if it doesn't, spring will arrive early.
In the movie, Phil goes to Punxsutawney to broadcast this event with his producer, Rita, and their cameraman, Larry. The groundhog sees his shadow, and thus winter should last six more weeks. And that should be the end of it. But in fact, it's just the beginning, for Phil wakes up the next day to find… that it is Groundhog Day all over again. Unfortunately, he's the only one who seems to realize that this day is “over”, already “come and gone”.
The rest of the movie is a comic exploration of a very extreme example of "deja vu," the feeling that one has already seen or experienced something. Trapped in some kind of time warp, Phil seems condemned to relive the same day over and over and over.
Fortunately, Phil is able to learn from the dilemma he finds himself in, and gradually takes advantage of all the knowledge he gets after continually reliving the same day. Once he knows what people will do, and how they think, and what they like, he soon learns to use his knowledge of the immediate future. He learns to make money, impress women, and eventually grow beyond his angry and selfish ways in order to help as many people as he can, including himself. [http://www.eslnotes.com/movies/html/groundhog-day.html]

Questions for Reflection
Phil: I'm reliving the same day over and over. It's like yesterday never happened.
01. Do you live this life like there was no previous one? Why?
Rita: Do you ever have déjà vu?
Phil: Didn't you just ask me that?
02. Do you ever have déjà vu? What do you think it means?
Rita: What did you do today?
Phil: Oh, same old, same old.
03: Are you living your life the same old way today? Why?
Phil: Well, what if there is no tomorrow? There wasn't one today.
04: Does tomorrow really exists? When? Today?
Ned (After Phil steps in puddle): Watch out for that first step.
05. Should you watch out only for the first, middle, last or every step?
Phil: I was in the Virgin Islands once. I met a girl. We ate lobster, drank pina coladas. At sunset we made love like sea otters. That was a pretty good day. Why couldn't I get that day… over and over and over?
06. Why can’t you live the good days over and over?
Gus (holding up glass): Some guys would look at this glass and they would say, "That glass is half empty." Other guys would say, "That glass is half full." I peg you as a "glass is half empty" kind of guy. Am I right?
07. What kind of person are you? Optimistic, pessimistic or realistic?
Phil: What would you do if you were stuck in one place and every day was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered? What if there were no tomorrow?
Gus: No tomorrow? That would mean there would be no consequences. There would be no hangovers. We could do whatever we wanted!
Phil: I’m not going to live by their rules anymore. You make choices and you live with them.
08. What would you do if there is no tomorrow? Why?
09. Do you live by redundant rules?
10. Do you gladly live with your choices?
Phil: Rita, if you only had one day to live, what would you do with it?
Rita: I don't know, Phil. What are you dying of?
Phil: No. I mean - the whole world is about to explode. What do you do?
11. What would you do if you only had one day to live? Why?
(You might really have only this day left to live!)
Rita: Don't you worry about cholesterol, lung cancer, love handles?
Phil: I don't worry about anything anymore.
Rita: What makes you so special? Everybody worries about something.
12. What worries you? Are they justified? Why?
Phil: Do you think I'm acting like this because I'm egocentric?
Rita: I know you're egocentric. It's your defining characteristic.
13. What are the defining characteristics (of your ego or egolessness)?
Phil: So what do you want out of life?
Rita: I guess I want what everybody wants: You know: career, love, marriage, children.
14: What do you want out of life? Why?
Rita: What do you want?
Phil: What I really want is someone like you.
15. Do you want someone perfect or to become someone perfect? Why?
Phil: Who is your perfect guy?
Rita: First of all, he’s too humble to know he’s perfect.
Phil: That’s me.
16. Do you think you are perfect? Are you proud if you think so?
Phil: People place too much emphasis on their careers. I wish we could all live in the mountains at high altitude. That’s where I see myself in five years. How about you?
Rita: I agree.
17. Where do you see yourself in five years? Why? What about tomorrow, or today?
Rita: I like to go with the flow, see where it leads me.
Phil: It’s led you here.
18. Do you go with the flow? Why?
Rita: I'm just amazed, and I'm not easily amazed.
Phil: About what?
Rita: How you can start a day with one kind of expectation and end up so completely different.
Phil: Well, do you like the way this day is turning out?
Rita: I like it very much. It's a perfect day. You couldn't plan a day like this.
Phil: Well, you can. It just takes an awful lot of work.
19. Do your days ever turn out as expected? Why?
20. Can you plan a perfect day? Why?
Phil: I love you.
Rita: You love me? You don’t even know me.
21. Can you love who or what you don’t really know?
Rita: What are you doing? Are you making some kind of list or something? Did you call up my friends and ask about what I like and what I don't like? Is this what love is for you?
Phil: No. This is real. This is love.
Rita: Stop saying that!You must be crazy. I could never love someone like you,Phil, because you could never love someone else but yourself.
Phil: That's not true. I don't even like myself. Give me another chance. (Rita slaps him.)
22. What is real love? Is it good understanding, communication or…? Why?
23. Do you love only yourself? Why?
Phil: I’ll give you a winter prediction. It’s gonna be cold. It’s gonna be gray and it’s gonna last you for the rest of your life.
24. Do you live self-fulfilling prophecies? Why?
Phil: I've come to the end of me. There's no way out now.
25. Is there ever no way out? Why?
Phil: I'm a god.
Rita: You're a god?
Phil: I'm a god. I'm not the “God” - I don't think [so].
Rita: Because you survived a car wreck?
Phil: I didn't just survive a wreck. I wasn't just blown up yesterday. I have been stabbed, shot, poisoned, frozen, hung, electrocuted, and burned.
Rita: Oh really?
Phil: Every morning I wake up without a scratch on me. Not a dent in the fender. I am an immortal.
26. Have you ever felt invincible or have a death wish? Why?
Phil: Maybe the real “God” uses tricks. Maybe he's not omnipotent. He's just been around so long, he knows everything.
27. Can there be an omnipotent, omniscient and omni-benevolent being? Who?
Rita (on Phil flipping cards into a hat): Is this what you do with eternity?
Phil: Now you know. That's not the worst part.
Rita: What's the worst part?
Phil: The worst part is that tomorrow you would have forgotten all about this and you'll treat me like a jerk again.
Rita: No.
Phil: It's alright. I am a jerk.
Rita: No you're not.
Phil: It doesn't make any difference. I've killed myself so many times, I don't even exist anymore.
Rita: Well, sometimes I wish I had a thousand lifetimes. I don't know, Phil. Maybe it's not a curse. It just depends on how you look at it.
28. What do you do with eternity? What would not be good about it?
29. Is rebirth a good, bad or neutral thing?
Phil: (Reading) “Only ‘God’ can make a tree.” Really?
30. Does it take (everything in) the universe to create the universe?
Phil: The first time I saw you, something happened to me. I never told you, but I knew I wanted to hold you as hard as I could. I don’t deserve someone like you.
31. Is it ever love, attachment at first sight, reconnection or something else?
Nurse: Sometimes people just die.
32. Can you accept sudden death (of yourself and others)? Why?
Phil: Yet we know that winter is just another step in the cycle of life.
33. Is the only unchanging thing change? Are changes always cyclic?
Phil: No matter what happens tomorrow, or the rest of my life, I'm happy now because I love you.
34. What is it that will make you happy no matter what happens tomorrow?
Phil: Something is different.
Rita: Good or bad?
Phil: Anything different is good… and this could be real good.
35. Is change definitely good, bad or neutral?
Phil: Do you know what today is?
Rita: No, what?
Phil: Today is tomorrow. It happened.
36. Isn’t today tomorrow in the sense that what you do today affects tomorrow?
Phil: Let's live here.
37. Is any particular place and time really better than here and now? Can you go there?
Points for Reflection
01. Beginning to Learn
The movie, as everyone knows, is about a man who finds himself living the same day over and over and over again. He is the only person in his world who knows this is happening, and after going through periods of dismay and bitterness, revolt and despair, suicidal self-destruction and cynical recklessness, he begins to do something that is alien to his nature. He begins to learn. [http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050130/REVIEWS08/501300301/1023]

02. Compassion for All
It is interesting that although Phil is initially a jerk by his behaviour, the audience naturally begin to feel compassion for his suffering, just as he too naturally begins to feel compassion for those suffering. Compassion then, is surely part of our true nature, given enough time and opportunity to awaken it.

03. When You Get It Right
[From] An interview with Robert Thurman, author of "Infinite Life: Seven Virtues for Living Well," who was the first Westerner ordained as a Tibetan Buddhist monk and one of Time magazine's 25 Most Influential People in 1997. Here's the nut graf, as far as I am concerned: "My new guru in life is Bill Murray, because actually the best metaphor for the infinite life, the reincarnation thing, is 'Groundhog Day.' You keep coming back until you get it right. When you get it right, then you have a really great time. Nirvana means you live with other beings in a really happy way. And we all could, in the 21st century -- if we used our brains a little better." [http://www.schindler.org/psacot/20010813_ghd.shtml]

04. Fresh Start Everyday
Groundhog day is a micro version of rebirth or compressed Samsara! It is likened to being caught in the cycle of birth and death. We are in a certain sense trapped, yet free - to free ourselves, to attain True Happiness, instead of fretting and resigning to "fate". Every day then, is a fresh Groundhog day - a fresh chance to stop repeating, and to make up for the mistakes we made yesterday. [http://www.moonpointer.com/stonepeace/backblog21.htm] Déjà vu experiences should in fact allow us to recall and prevent the same mistakes.
05. No Tomorrow?
Trapped in a time-warp of the worst day of your life? Are you living the same day over and over again? Are there no consequences for doing so? Or will the consequences repeat according to what we repeat? If you live life like there is no tomorrow in a negative way, there will be no positive tomorrow. This is the law of karma at play. But there is also no tomorrow, in the sense that only today is real, while tomorrow is always coming – which becomes the today you shaped. We are stuck in space and time when we do not change. But even if everyday is the “same”, what can differ is a change of mind. As such, there are still many possibilities to choose from.
06. Parallel to Monastic Practice
This film parallels Buddhist practice. In a training temple, the wake-up bell rings the same time every day. You go to the same place, wear the same clothes, and follow the same routine, and yet each moment is unique. Not distracted by your desire for changed conditions, you can live each moment not knowing what it will bring, seeing the familiar landscape with new eyes.
[http://www.intrex.net/chzg/wenger2.htm]